Lost in You

by Lexi Blake

  “I’m trying to understand what happened to Steven and Veronica.” Rebecca’s words cut through her misery, reminding her she still had a job to do.

  “I don’t know why you would care,” Louisa replied. Her English was excellent and she spoke it with a light German accent. Ariel would bet she’d spent a lot of time in other countries. She was a bit younger than Rebecca. She was the assistant to the VP of research for Kronberg Pharmaceutical, and if Rebecca was right, also slept with her married boss. “Steven was an ass. Veronica wasn’t as sweet as she seemed to be.”

  “How do you mean?” Rebecca was getting good at interrogation. She had a friendly style that brought people in. “She was always nice to me.”

  “I don’t trust anyone that nice. Veronica seemed like a scared little mouse, but then I would get security reports about her being in sections she wasn’t supposed to be in,” Louisa replied. “I have no idea why she liked to prowl around the lab at night. And I don’t need to tell you Steven was terrible. You were the only one worth anything and Dr. McDonald knew it. Is Steven the reason you dragged your therapist all the way to Germany?”

  It was their cover. Ariel was helping Rebecca confront what had happened to her here in Munich. “She doesn’t completely understand what went on and why Dr. Reasor attacked her that day. It’s helpful to hear from people who were there. There were events going on around the same time and she needs to know if they’re connected. It would help her put the episode behind her.”

  A cunning smile crept across Louisa’s face. “But no one is exactly sure what happened. You’re right. There was a lot of drama surrounding your departure.”

  “I figured if anyone knew, it would be you,” Rebecca said. “You know everything about the company. Everyone talks to you.”

  Louisa took a drink of her beer and sat back, looking satisfied with the compliments. “It’s because they know to get to my boss, they have to get to me. All right. I’m interested in helping you. You weren’t obnoxious. I don’t know the whole story. There are things the boss doesn’t tell even me.”

  And that bothered her. Louisa thought she should be in the middle of everything. Being shut out would upset her. It always helped to know what motivated a person. Louisa needed to feel like she was the center of attention. It was an easy thing to offer. “That doesn’t seem like a smart thing to do. You’re a team. I’ve always found the support team for a boss is usually smarter than the boss.”

  “He’s practically a senile old man,” Louisa said with a dismissive wave of her hand. She was on her third beer and they hadn’t been here very long. Louisa took the term “happy hour” seriously. “I run that office, but old men need to keep their secrets. What do you want to know?”

  Rebecca leaned forward. “The last time I saw Steven, he told me I didn’t understand the scope of Dr. McDonald’s research. She’d asked me if I wanted to go to Buenos Aires with her. Steven didn’t want me to go and that was when he…well, I won’t go into the details, but he was why I left. He scared me.”

  “He must have since you never looked back.” Louisa glanced around. “Look, I don’t know everything about it, but I know she was doing something the big bosses didn’t want the press to find out about. I assumed it was something about her testing. She wouldn’t be the first to ignore protocol in search of a breakthrough. She was likely using testing methods the world wouldn’t approve of and that’s why they were so careful with her. My boss personally looked at her daily reports.”

  “We were working on a cure for several degenerative brain diseases,” Rebecca said. “I was in that lab every single day. I was responsible for a lot of those protocols. I never saw anything that would worry me.”

  Louisa tipped her beer Rebecca’s way. “Well, I think you were brought in for different reasons than Steven. You had some incredible instincts and she was working on a problem. You were working on the same problem in your own research. Dr. McDonald always could find bright minds to steal from.”

  “I thought Dr. Reasor was quite smart.” According to Rebecca he’d had a brilliant mind. It was the only thing she could believe Tucker and Reasor had in common.

  “Oh, Steven was smart, but that wasn’t why she hired him. Maybe it was in the beginning, but he was more like her defender, if that makes sense. What’s the term I’m looking for? Second in command? He made sure she got what she needed. He scared all of the employees. He kept copious records and investigated everyone who came in contact with him. If he found dirt, he would use it as leverage to do her will. I thought when you left that he’d found something on you.”

  Rebecca shook her head. “No, he made me run for different reasons.”

  From what Ariel had learned, she believed Steven Reasor had used the time dilation drug to torture Rebecca. He hadn’t physically harmed her, but the drug had made it seem like he had. She would have been extremely open to suggestion. She’d been so frightened by the experience that she’d left the country and her job behind. She’d buried the memory deep and it had only come out when she’d seen him again in Toronto.

  It hadn’t been long after Rebecca had fled that Steven Reasor himself had disappeared. Not that they had proof he’d ever really existed.

  “What do you know about how he died?” Rebecca asked.

  “I know the rumors and I know what I think is true.” Louisa sat back and looked completely serious for once. “The rumor is he went away with Veronica Croft for a weekend before he left for Argentina. Some people say he blackmailed her into it. He was obviously into her. If you were in a room with the two of them, his eyes were on her. She might have been attracted to him, but his behavior put her off. At least that was what she said. I wouldn’t put it past him to blackmail her into his bed. He didn’t come back to the office after that. I assumed he flew directly from Paris to Argentina. That was where her other lab was.”

  “And that was the same time McDonald cleared out her lab here?” Ariel asked.

  Louisa nodded. “Well, she cleared out far more than that. You can’t tell anyone I told you this, but shortly after Steven and Veronica took their trip to Paris, it was like the world exploded. My boss got called in and everyone was here. There were some people I didn’t even know were associated with the company. Wealthy, influential people. I wasn’t in the meeting, but no one was happy when they came out.”

  Rebecca’s gaze was steady on Louisa. “What do you think happened?”

  “Well, the project was shut down immediately,” Louisa explained. “I was never told exactly what it was about. I was only the secretary. But it wasn’t hard to figure it out. Someone found out what McDonald had been doing. Whoever it was confronted her and she ran. Or she caught wind of what was happening and she ran. She took everything. The night that she left the country, the Kronberg executives worked overtime to cover their asses, as you Americans say. They cleaned it all up and we’re stronger than ever. And if anyone comes after us, well, my boss taught me how to handle that. He’s a bit like Steven in that way.”

  So he did keep a file. Somewhere in that building was the information Kim needed to jump into the game and free the men. This was exactly what they needed.

  “He kept some leverage?” Rebecca asked.

  “Always, but I think this was serious leverage. Let’s just say there’s a safe in his office that not even I know the code to.” Louisa looked up and a waitress was approaching with their food. “Rebecca, I hope this brings you some peace. You need to know that even if Dr. McDonald was doing something she shouldn’t, it won’t ever get out. My boss will make sure of it. You’re safe. As for Steven Reasor, well, you’re safe from him, too. I wouldn’t be surprised if the company had a hand in that. Like I said, there were many people in and out of the offices after she left, and I would bet some of them were connected to powerful agencies. You’re safe, my friend.”

  The waitress set down the tray and started passing around the food.

  Ariel glanced at Rebecca, who was smiling at Louisa.


  “That is exactly what I needed to hear. Thank you so much,” Rebecca said before looking down at her plate. “Schnitzel. Oh, how I have missed you. Why don’t we talk about happier things? Tell me all the gossip.”

  Ariel looked down at her own plate. She wasn’t hungry at all. She looked back, hoping to get a glimpse of Robert. He’d been standing outside the church with a camera around his neck, looking every inch the curious tourist.

  He wasn’t there now. Where had he gone? She started to pull out her phone to text him. If something had happened…

  The door to the church came open and he slipped back outside. His shoulders were straight, and even from here she could see the way his jaw was tense. He took up his place again, but he wasn’t pretending to be a tourist. He simply stood there.

  She could feel him staring at her.

  She took a sip of her wine and tried to force herself to listen to the conversation.

  All the while she wondered why he’d gone into that church.

  Chapter Eleven

  Robert stared across the plaza at the restaurant where Ariel and Rebecca were sitting down with the target. He probably shouldn’t think of her as the target. He should call her the witness or something, but he was in a nasty place and even the words in his head seemed to have sharp edges.

  He knew Ari needed time to process what had happened earlier today. Hell, he knew he needed time, but he didn’t want to take it. He wanted to get her in bed and reassure them both that they belonged together.

  He wasn’t Russell Seeger. He wasn’t going to let himself be treated like his body belonged to someone. His soul was completely different and it belonged to Ariel. She had to see that.

  “If I were a murderer I could kill you now,” Sasha said. “You need to get your head in the game. Not that I expect any excitement. Do we really need four of us out here in a public place? I think Tucker is only here because he wants to buy clothes. I pray he finds socks that can handle his stink.”

  “You know why we’re here.” Though he would admit that there was some truth to what Sasha had said. It felt good to be outside, to breathe fresh air and remind himself there was a sun in the sky.

  “Yes, we’re here because Damon and Big Tag told us to be here.”

  He didn’t want to have this fight again. “If you want to go back, feel free. You can catch a cab at the entrance.”

  “You must truly be off your game if you’re not going to give me one of those rah-rah speeches of yours.” Sasha leaned against the white wall of St. Michael’s church, watching the tourists go in and out of the massive wooden doors.

  It was a gorgeous day and he wasn’t sure he’d ever seen a sky that same color of blue. The plaza was packed with shoppers and tourists. This part of the city center was pedestrian only, all the streets blocked off to traffic. It was where the city held its festivals and Christmas markets.

  Had he come here with Emily?

  Why did the thought of him walking through the Marienplatz holding Emily’s hand make him vaguely nauseous? Who had that man been? Obviously he’d been a soldier, but why had he gone into the Army? Had it been because he loved his country or because he hadn’t had any other prospects?

  “Hey, stop thinking about it or you’ll be sick right here,” Sasha said. “Do I need to punch you? I don’t know how they will take it here. If we were in Russia no one would care, but Germans tend to follow the rules of society.”

  He shook it off. Sasha was right. He’d been about to dive down that deep hole. “I’m fine. I’ll concentrate on the job.”

  “Have you thought at all about what Dante and I said the other day?” Sasha stared out, his eyes on the café across the way.

  “I have, but I think we need to wait until we get back to London so we can all be together to discuss it.” He turned and looked up at the statue that stood between the two big doors. It was a bronze work depicting St. Michael defeating Satan. The saint held his long spear to the devil’s throat.

  Sasha’s voice went to a whisper. “You haven’t thought at all about the fact that we’re more closely watched in London? If we want to do anything at all about it we should do it while we’re here.”

  Robert turned to face him. “What the hell are you talking about doing?”

  “Has it occurred to anyone that we were trained for this?”

  “Trained for what?”

  Sasha’s eyes rolled. “Dr. McDonald trained us. She taught us how to rob a bank. Why don’t we simply go into the place and take what we need? You might not want your memory back, but I do.”

  “We don’t even know where it is or if it’s there,” Robert shot back. “We have no idea if there’s a cure at all.”

  “But that data could give me my name,” Sasha argued. “It could…never mind. You think getting your memories back means losing Ariel. Jax doesn’t care. Tucker really doesn’t want to remember who he was.”

  He hadn’t realized how isolated Dante and Sasha must feel. When they’d first come out of McDonald’s lab, they’d been matched pairs. Dante and Sasha had been close and Jax and Tucker had stuck together. Over time Jax and Tucker had integrated with the rest of The Garden, but Dante and Sasha had held themselves apart. “I promise I will do everything I can to reunite you with whoever is out there. I promise. I won’t let you down.”

  Sasha’s jaw went tight. “I know you will. You are a good man. And I know Damon is, too, but there are higher powers in play and being good doesn’t always work out. We should know that more than any others. You’re being naïve. You want to be one of them, but you are not. We are not. We’re still merely a job for McKay-Taggart.”

  His cell phone buzzed in his pocket. “Give me a second.”

  Sasha said nothing, simply took out the camera they’d given him and started taking pictures. He moved around the front of the church, blending in with the rest of the tourists chronicling their adventures.

  Robert pulled out the phone and swiped the screen to get to the text that had just been sent.

  Hello, Rob. I’m happy you’re back to fighting shape after our last round. Sorry for shooting you, but I had to slow Ariel down. I’m sitting in the back pew on the right side if you would like to discuss the situation. Don’t forget we’re not alone.

  Fucking Levi Green.

  He looked over at Sasha. Peter was across the plaza. He couldn’t even see Tucker.

  He could text Ariel and let her know. Another ping let him know Levi was still texting.

  Don’t keep me waiting, man. Come on. I’m not here to fight. How about I give you a gift?

  He knew he should ignore it, but he’d had a day. He quickly texted back.

  How about you fuck off?

  How many men did Levi have hanging around? He’d selected a very public place so the likelihood of a firefight wasn’t high. It didn’t mean Levi couldn’t drag him into the shadows, but he was ready for that. If he were going to arrest them all, wouldn’t he simply do it?

  The screen flickered and then a picture filled it. Robert stopped, staring down in disbelief.

  It was a picture of Ariel. She wore the same clothes she wore right now, the dress she’d put on this morning when she’d gotten ready for her meeting with Emily. He would have known since he’d been the one to zip her up. She had the same white Prada bag over her shoulder and her hair was in a halo around her head. She was sitting on a stone bench and she wasn’t alone.

  Kimberly Solomon sat next to her.

  She’d met with Solo today?

  She hadn’t mentioned that piece of news to him. The Agency was here and she was meeting with them. Had she met with Levi, too?

  Every little whisper he’d heard lately rained down on him.

  What if he was wrong?

  “Damn it, Robert. I’m not cleaning up after…” Sasha set the camera against his chest again. “What’s going on?”

  “Levi Green is in the church.”

  Sasha’s brow rose. “Is he planning on killing us here?�
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  “He wants to talk to me.” He should shut down everything right now, but that picture…

  “I’ll back you up.” Sasha looked behind him, staring at the table where Ariel and Rebecca sat gathering information. “They’re fine. Peter and Tucker are still watching. No one will notice if we slip away. I’ll have your back if you want to talk to him.”

  Ariel was talking to Solo. Why shouldn’t he do the same?

  Because Solo never shot you, moron.

  He wasn’t listening to reason.

  Come on, Rob. I’m offering you knowledge they won’t give you. Ten minutes. It’s all I ask and I’ll tell you exactly who your girlfriend is.

  Robert turned and walked in the door.

  He went from the bright light of day to the shadow of the vestibule, from the vibrant sounds of the Marienplatz to the hushed murmurs of a working church that also functioned as a tourist site.

  What the fuck was he doing?

  “I’m going to keep my eyes on you,” Sasha promised. “I won’t be far away. You’re doing the right thing. You’re being our leader.”

  He wasn’t sure about that, but he knew he had to face the man. He had to ask him about that picture. He had to know what Levi knew about Ariel.

  He walked into the church, his sneakers thudding along the white marble of the floor. The high altar was the focal point of the building and there were hundreds of tourists walking around the sanctuary, taking pictures of the stained-glass windows and the reliquaries, but he had one focus.

  The sanctuary was in three sections. He moved past the candles toward the far side of the church. The middle section of pews ran all the way back, but the sides were shorter. He had to make his way around and through the crowds.

  A dark-haired man sat in the last pew, his arm casually around the back. He looked like he was simply studying the great altar, perhaps contemplating the nature of God.